It’s been 10 months since I wrote my last film review and to be honest, I wondered if I’d ever get back to writing about films again. The number of films I’ve watched has only increased over time but my desire to write about them seems to have faded. There was something, though, about Allied, which was so powerful that I immediately felt the urge to take my laptop out and start typing. I’m writing this sitting on a plane from Beijing to London and for the first time in a while I’m truly feeling motivated to write a review.

Flicking through Air China’s selection of films on board my flight I was truly disappointed by the range of films on offer. There wasn’t a single one that I particularly wanted to watch. After I finished the book I brought with me, I knew I was going to have to watch at least one of these films to save myself from boredom so I opted for Allied. I’m a big fan of both Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard so I figured this would be, at least, passable. In the end, however, this film ended up touching my heart in a way that I didn’t expect at all.

The Little Paris Bookshop is the story of Jean Perdu, a French bookseller with a unique talent for telling his customers exactly what book they need to ‘cure’ them. Running his bookshop on a barge on the Seine in Paris, Perdu lives a monotonous life that has lost its colour. When he is forced to read a long-forgotten and unopened letter from a former lover, Perdu resolves to fight the demons of his past and find a way to move forwards in life.VIEW STORY »

I haven’t watched too many animes, but I’ve loved those that I have seen. Even though there are often English dubbed episodes available, I still prefer to watch anime with the original Japanese voices because it feels a bit wrong to watch anime with a squeaky American voice over the top. I was looking for a really good anime, with lots of romance but also some sort of other purpose and my friend recommended Sword Art Online to me and I really regret not listening to his advice sooner, because it was awesome!

Story

SAO is basically about Kirito, a teenage boy, who is really into gaming and was fortunate enough to be selected as one of the one thousand beta testers of a new game: Sword Art Online. This game is like pretty much any other video game (it kinda reminds me of Zelda) except you’re plugged into the system via NerveGear which is like a helmet that you put you put on whilst playing and your human body basically turns comatose until you log out of the game. The beta test is really successful so it isn’t long before the game is mass produced and there are ten thousand players plugged into the system (think Matrix). The only problem is, this time they can’t log out. It turns out this isn’t a glitch in the system, but something put in place by the SAO’s creator in order to trap these ten thousand people in a virtual reality. To make matters worse, your prolonged existence in the real world, depends on your ability to stay alive in the virtual reality. When your HP reaches zero in SAO, your real body will also die. The only way to escape SAO is to reach level 100, beating the boss at each level. Still thinking this doesn’t sound so hard? Well, the boss on each level is pretty much impossible to get past, unless you’re Kirito with bags of experience from the beta test. Within a few weeks, thousands of the players have died and those that remain are desperate to reach the top. Instead of partying up with other players, the safer option, Kirito insists on making his way through the game alone, but on his way up he meets Asuna, another pretty damn good player, and from then on their stories are intertwined.

SAO is actually split into two series, there’s a part one and a part two. The paragraph above is a very brief summary of the premise of part one but I can’t really tell you anything about part two without giving away what happens at the end of part one. There is quite a definite divide in between the two series and although part two continues straight on from the end of part one, the two stories are really different and yet really similar at the same time. I suppose the general structure and set up of part two is the same as part one, but as the plot is different and the characters have developed a lot.

Personally, I found the story to be really emotional and I mean genuine emotions and not the sort of emotions induced by a whishy-washy rom-com. I think I cried several times whilst watching SAO because it is really heartbreaking at times. The first half of part one is quite action based and I didn’t find this part as interesting as the second half of part one. However, the first few episodes are very good for setting the story up and introducing different characters. I think this first half was needed to establish that this game was no joke and that the subject matter of this series was actually quite serious. I do not mean to say that this series is serious as it’s actually quite amusing and heartwarming at times, but I think that the creators were really good at mixing the lighthearted material with the fact that all the characters were trapped in a virtual reality where most of them were doomed to die and the balancing of these two things is what made this series so great.

Characters
I think that character development and character relations can be quite weak in animes, but I think it was very much the opposite in SAO. There are many, many characters that come and go, but the two protagonists are Kirito and Asuna. I found the relationship between the pair of the to be absolutely beautiful and it developed at exactly the right pace (no insta-love to be seen – hooray!). There were a few moments where I thought the relationship between some characters was getting a little weird, but these moments were infrequent and pretty inconsequential. (I also think that what I think is weird, probably didn’t seem that weird to Japanese people). Kirito plays a much larger role than Asuna and therefore you can see the relationship between himself and many other characters play out too and those are equally well developed and allow you to see the different sides of Kirito. Unsurprisingly, the characters are all very much affected by their traumatic experiences in SAO and I’m glad the character development reflected this and everything that happened was rather logical, despite the fact that this is a fantasy.

Artwork
I don’t think that the graphics in terms of fluidity of movement and all that jazz was particularly outstanding or noteworthy; however, I do feel that the stills that you could gleam from this series (i.e. screenshotting certain moments) were really beautiful. The characters themselves, the costumes, the scenery etc. is all really intricate and just darn cool. If you’re not going to watch this series, then at least google ‘Sword Art Online’ so you can see for yourself the awesome images which are either really bright and colourful or dark and sinister looking. The way that things look is probably one of my favourite things about this series and I’ll definitely be drawing (make that attempting to draw) a couple of the stills.

OST
I think I listened to the SAO OST before I actually began watching it and that was the final push in getting me to start watching. I believe that the OST of any drama/anime is so important as it really sets the tone of the whole series and the SAO OST complemented the action so perfectly. It wasn’t just the opening and ending tracks that had me hooked, but also the score from the actual episodes, so the background music during fight scenes, romantic scenes etc. The opening/ending tracks actually change half way through when part two starts and I think that perhaps the OST for part two is slightly better, though, all four tracks are excellent. I think I’m going to download the SAO score and play it in the background as I go about life just to make everything seem more dramatic and important because it really was that awesome. Usually I don’t pay much attention to the score as in general the opening and ending theme songs tend to stick out a lot more, but not with SAO. In this case, the score was probably even better than the opening/ending tracks which is quite a rarity.

Conclusion
All in all, this anime has a great plot, great characters, beautiful artwork and an emotional OST – I don’t think it’s done anything wrong. A perfect balance between romance and action is struck in SAO so I think it will appeal to all anime fans, whether male or female. I am completely in love with the OST, in fact I’m listening to it right now; I’ve changed my desktop wallpaper to a shot from SAO and if I ever decide to participate in cosplay, I can tell you now that I’ll be dressing up as Asuna. This series gripped me for all 25 episodes and my interest never waned. Although each episode is only twenty minutes long and yet so much seems to happen in each episode. I thought that the ending of this series could’ve been slightly better, but it was by no means disappointing. I honestly cannot recommend this series enough and if you’ve never watched any anime then SAO would be a great place to start as it mixes a lot of different anime genres together.

Title: Against All OddsAuthor: Aliaa El-NasharGenre: YA RomanceGoodreads Summary: The Story revolves around:
-A boy called Damien who seems to have it all. He’s rich, good-looking and athletic. He’s also arrogant, obnoxious and a major player. Damien is one of 5 children who seem to not get along, until one day Damien meets Alexis and his life is turned inside out.
-A girl called Alexis who has trust issues due to her parents. Her best friends mean the world to her, and she refuses to date anyone that doesn’t fit completely in her ‘Perfect Guy’ list.
They’re thrown together a lot and start to face inner demons they’ve hidden away for so long.

{Review}

I haven’t read a YA romance in quite a while so I was excited to get my teeth into Against All Odds. It seemed to me like your stereotypical teen romance; however, there were, to my surprise, some deeper family issues addressed as well.

I thought the first half of the novel was very good. A wide variety of characters were introduced and the way that their lives and deeper issues all connected was very interesting; however, the second half did drag a little. I’d say it’s pretty obvious what happens at the end of the book so I spent most of the second half waiting for it to happen. That said, the anticipation for the happy ending kept me reading and reading until I had finished the book.

What’s interesting is that this book is written from several different perspectives which gives such a great insight into all the characters feelings. This is very important in this novel as most people’s feelings go unsaid, at least until the end passages. I think this brought my closer to all the characters and I, as a reader, felt much more involved in the story. As the story was told from several perspectives, an element of humour was added as it was funny to see the miscommunication and naivety of the characters.

I’m not really sure why, but I really have thing for rich and arrogant boys in books, so Damien was definitely my favourite character. His character changes completely over the course of the novel and it’s really interesting to see how love can change a person. I also liked the female protagonist, Alexis, as she appeared to be a strong character, who was actually a bit mushy on the inside. All the characters have something deeper going on in their lives and more and more is learned as the plot gradually unravels. Usually I don’t like it when books have too many characters because I get awfully confused and start to question the relevance of just about everything, but I liked that there were a lot of people involved in this story because it meant that there was lots going on and lots of different thoughts being thrown around (in a good way).

All in all, I really enjoyed Against All Odds and thought it was an engaging teen read with some surprising plot twists and turns and ultimately, the happy ending we’ve all been searching for.

{ Author Interview }

1. What inspired you to write Against All Odds?

*Against All Odds started as a descriptive essay for an English class in school, I was 16, turning on 17. The English teacher had been flexible and would allow us to hand in the assignments as we do them, which was good because with a deadline I usually ended up with something so mundane. Suddenly I was inspired and came up with this scene on the hill. A girl looking through a fog of sand not sure whether the guy she hadn’t realized she was in love with was dead or alive as his motorbike fell off the cliff. Then I started to describe the mixture of emotions she went through till she saw he was alive, but now she realized she was in love and didn’t know what to do with it. It was a short descriptive essay. A friend of mine read it, then begged me to write it into an actual story. I had to create background stories for each character, lives, and identities, then a storyline that would lead to this particular plot.

2. Are any of the characters based on people you know in real life?
* I personally believe a writer accidentally pours a bit of himself in the characters he chooses, sometimes in the heroes and other times the villains. Sometimes he pours someone he knows into them. So, my characters are made up, yet they hold qualities in me or my family or friends.

3. Which character did you most enjoy writing?
*I think that would have to be a tie between William and Edmund. They’re my favourite characters, though William more than Edmund too. I can’t wait to tell their stories! William is so vague, quiet, you never know what he’s thinking. Edmund is so mysterious, he’s got all this horrible history and you realize you’ve never known them. Their characters run very deep.
4. Will you be writing a sequel to Against All Odds?
*I’ve hinted to a lot of side stories in the book and hope to see them through. Each and every Martinez sibling has a special story in my head, and I can’t wait to tell it. Even Scott, Clay and Tristan.

5. What’s your all-time favourite book and why?
*Wuthering Heights. That book is brilliant. It’s what got me into reading in the first place. The book is so manipulative and has you so emotionally invested in it, you can’t help but feel alongside the characters. What I love the most about it is that there’s not one character in the book that you hold the same opinion of from start to end.

6. If you could swap lives with any literary character, which would you choose?
*Penelope Featherington from Julia Quinn’s Bridgerton Series. Her story is told in ‘Romancing Mr. Bridgerton’. I am a strong believer that the perfect era was England in the 1800’s. Not sure why, but the idea of reading, riding, painting, all those carriages, balls, dances, summering in the countryside fascinates me. Penelope in particular, I see myself so much in her and would love to be her. The perfect era, the perfect character. I feel a kinship towards her and we have a lot in common. My mother forcing me into functions and family luncheons I’d rather not be in. Me not being the best looking of my siblings. Basically a wallflower at gatherings, or in life in general, not many people notice me and I just watch others. But she leads this super amazing secret life, everyone loves her without knowing it, she’s ok with not depending on a man for her livelihood and makes something of herself. She’s smart, funny, an ugly duckling only to those who don’t bother knowing the real her. She gives me hope that one day my ‘Colin Bridgerton’ will finally stop procrastinating and wasting about and find me!

7. Which author, if any, would you compare yourself to?
*Wow, compare myself to? I wish I was as good as many others. I wouldn’t compare to them, everyone has their particular style, story and everything. I love a lot of authors, and their writings and style; like Meg Cabot and Julia Quinn.

8. Do you have any advice for budding young writers?
*My advice would be to never give up, let their creative energies roll, and that a writer never really stops writing so might as well get used to it being a part of their daily routines. It’s more fun that way, a dull bus ride can seem like the most exciting thing ever if you have the perfect ideas rolling in your head.

9. What are you working on next?
*I am working on two stories simultaneously. One, the sequel to ‘Against All Odds’, being Edmund’s story. The other, a fantasy story very different to this one.

10. Finally, if you were a biscuit, what sort of biscuit would you be? 🙂
*I’d be one of those delicious digestive cookies you eat with tea. Not the ones with chocolate though, plain ones are so much better.

{ Author Guest Post }

Feline Fashion Consultant.
I woke up, washed up, went to my room, stood in front of my cupboard and as always I had no idea what to wear. Normally I don’t even give a damn what I wear, as long as all the right parts of me are covered, why care? Most of the time my clothes doesn’t even match, the colors would be a mess on a canvas, and I also don’t coordinate it with the weather going around either.

Today on the other hand is one of the rare days where I actually DO care about what I am about to wear because it’s a special occasion where I am forced to wear ‘formal’. Formal is usually a state of dress I run like the wind from because, who wants to dress formally? I mean really?! My basic outfits are casual. I only own 2 high heel shoes and they’ve been with me forever. I don’t own normal shoes, just Converse and trainers. Though I do have a few flats – again have been with me forever. But I am no more comfortable in flats than I am in heels.

Anyhow, back on topic. I found an outfit that I think a ctually looked formal. The black trousers, the white shirt, though I wasn’t sure if they fit together, so I went to the most trusted confidante of mines to ask for her opinion. Her royal highness was rolling on the rug – naturally I never got what so fascinated her with said rug, but if her highness wanted to roll in it, then why not? I cleared my throat to get her attention, but she was on a roll – no pun intended – and wouldn’t pay me any attention. So I just started with my question anyway “What do you think?” She looked up all of a sudden, surprised about me deeming myself worthy of her royal presence, but after looking me in the eye -obviously to warn me off such a tactical error again later – she looked me up and down then responded “mee-uw mee-uw”, not the normal “meeeooowwws” I usually get when I’ve clearly committed a folly, it even held a majestic drawl the way she said it, so I took that as a good sign indeed.

I mean sure, I guess by now I should have learned her language, she has clearly learned mine – and chosen to ignore whatever I say – I on the other hand have been remiss with my “Feline-guistics” but I’ve been so busy.

—

I’d just like to thank Aliaa for answering all my questions with such detail and for writing a fab guest post! 🙂

Title: StainedAuthor: Ella JamesPublication Date: Sept. 14th 2011Publisher: Barkley’s BooksGoodreads Synopsis: After a fire destroys seventeen-year-old Julia’s home and kills her foster parents, she chases the half-demon responsible across the country and back, determined to avenge her family and discover why a host of celestial baddies want her dead. With Julia is enigmatic hottie – Cayne, who has his own score to settle with the half-demon, and who might be just as dangerous as the creature he and Julia hunt.VIEW STORY »

About the book:

Max West is a widower raising Phoebe, his four-year-old daughter. Phoebe has to live with the fact that the day she was born is also the day of her mother’s death. As her fifth year without her mother approaches, Phoebe finds solace in her godmother, Amy Riley, and her daughter, Grace Crawford, another single parent family.
Amy Riley is a successful fashion designer who spends most of her days raising her four-year-old daughter, Grace, while her wayward boyfriend is travelling the world making the next best film. As the fifth year without her best friend looms she finds comfort in her ex-boyfriend, Max, and his daughter, Phoebe.
These two “broken” families have a tough week to face as the dreaded day approaches.However through their past, present and debatable future will their choices affect the outcome both parents clearly want and are simply denying? Or will Phoebe and Grace lose the only “whole” family they have ever known?VIEW STORY »

Around the time that One Day came out in cinemas, I felt like everyone was talking about it, though, considering I go to an all girl’s high school, that’s not entirely surprising. Many of my friends had read the book and told me that it was absolutely incredible and I had to read it. Unfortunately, I didn’t have enough time to read it before watching the film so I can’t tell you how close to the novel the film is; however, the general consesus among my friends – and most women – is that the film does not do the book justice. The first time I watched One Day I thought it was absolutely brilliant. I was blown away by the intensely moving story and found myself leaving the cinema in floods of tears. I thought to myself, if the film doesn’t do the book justice then that must be one hell of a book. However, I think I may have been swept up in the moment because when I got home and really analysed the film, I realised that it wasn’t that great.

I’m going to be honest with you. I had absolutely no interest in seeing Legally Blonde and my sole motivation for booking tickets to see it was because I had to entertain some French girls on a Saturday night at a fairly low price. Ever since this musical first came to London I’ve wondered how on earth they could’ve possibly turned a movie into a musical and wondered even more about how it could be so successful. However, after seeing it, my views have totally transformed and I think I’d go as far as to say this is the best musical I’ve ever seen.VIEW STORY »

Forced to entertain a French exchange student for the weekend I racked my brains trying to think of anything I could do that wouldn’t involve much talking. Then it hit me. The cinema. The perfect place to hide in the dark with the perfect excuse to avoid conversation. There aren’t many films out at the moment which are light hearted a jovial and then best thing I could find with a plot line that wasn’t too complex for my exchange and I was ‘Like Crazy’. I had assumed that this film was a light hearted chick flick, but I was wrong. I was surprised to find that Like Crazy is actually quite an emotional romantic drama.

The story follows two college students, Jacob and Anna, who fall in love, but face a seemingly insurmountable problem as Anna is actually a British student studying on an American Visa. When the time comes for Anna to return to the UK, she decides that she cannot bear to part with Jacob and so she violates the terms of her Visa rendering it impossible for her to re-enter the US. This is a truly heart-breaking love story of two young people desperate to stay together despite the miles and miles of ocean between them.VIEW STORY »

I wasn’t really sure what to make of The Dragonfly Prophecy when it first landed on my doorstep as I had never heard of this novel before, nor did I have any preconceptions. When I first saw it, I thought this book was all about dragonflies. It is not. Whether or not this is a good thing or bad thing is for you to decide, but, I repeat, The Dragonfly Prophecy is not about dragonflies. It is; however, about 17 year old Lexi Blane who seems to be living the perfect life. She has a boyfriend who adores her and parents who’d do anything for her, but there’s just one problem – Lexi has sudden and inexplicable fainting spells.

In addition, she has odd dreams when she’s unconscious, or maybe reality is actually just a dream and the dreams are reality. Lexi’s life is turned upside down as she is suddenly thrust into a war between two worlds, reality and the alternative reality, but first she needs to figure out what’s real and what’s just a dream, who she can and cannot trust, and most importantly – which side she’s on. Two guys, from different worlds, are fighting for her affections and whilst she’s in love with both, she knows she has to make a choice; however, one of them is lying to her – but which one is it? Lexi’s life quickly spirals out of control as she finds out she is, in fact, ‘gifted’ with special abilities and with these abilities comes a long list of responsibilities. She soon realises that there may be other forces at work in her life, was it fate that she survived the fatal car accident that killed her parents?VIEW STORY »